


The dawn of hope

by IoccasionallyWriteStories



Category: Newsies - All Media Types, Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: Fantasy AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-02
Updated: 2019-03-02
Packaged: 2019-11-08 05:38:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,217
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17975474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IoccasionallyWriteStories/pseuds/IoccasionallyWriteStories
Summary: The sun is coming up and six year old Elmer is teary eyed, breathing too rapidly and panicking just a bit too much. The warnings of older Black Hellebore sprites ring around in his mind, reminding him of the fact that he should be home before the sun rises. He's lost in the century old woods and who knows what fate awaits him after sunrise. Who knows what the daydwellers will do with a creature of the night.





	The dawn of hope

The sun is coming up and six year old Elmer is teary eyed, breathing too rapidly and panicking just a bit too much. The warnings of older Black Hellebore sprites ring around in his mind, reminding him of the fact that he should be home before the sun rises. He's lost in the century old woods and who knows what fate awaits him after sunrise. Who knows what the daydwellers will do with a creature of the night. 

His foot catches behind a tree trunk and Elmer smacks face first unto the ground. In the back of his mind he knows he should move, but his body isn't reacting and he stays on the floor, sobbing quietly. "Hey", a voice whispers and Elmer looks up. In the dim morning light, the hair of the boy crouched in front of him gains a faint red glow. "Are you alright?"

Shaking his head, Elmer gets up. "No. I'm lost and day is coming." The other boy frowns. "Yeah and?" Then he notices the dark shimmers underneath Elmer's skin and the night reflected in his eyes. "Oh", he says. "Where do you live? I'll take you there." He reaches out for Elmer, who immediately scoots backwards.

"Don't touch me, you'll die. I live near the lake, please take me there." The red haired boy nods and beckons Elmer to follow him. For a while, Elmer doubts that the other kid is taking him to the right place as he doesn't recognise his surroundings. It stays that way until a gate laced with several dark and poisonous flowers appear. Elmer lets out a sigh of relief. "Thank you." He waves the other boy goodbye as he passes the gate and disappears into a flurry of dark dust.

When the night reappears and Elmer wakes up, he rises to the sound of discontent murmuring. Blinking the sleep out of his eyes, he greets the older members of his group. "Hello everyone, what's going on?" Grandma Bronya, the oldest sprite of the group gives him a harsh stare. "You were late boy. Against my orders, Julia went to look for you. She did not return. Don't let it happen again."

Fearfully, Elmer asks: "What will happen to her? Will she be alright?" With a grave voice, grandma Bronya responds. "Not all flowers bloom in the light. Forget about that girl."

Elmer spends the night looking for his older sister throughout the whole forest. He calls her name, visits her favourite spots, but there's no sign of her. When the night comes to an end and the sun is on its way to rising, Elmer sits at the gate. He has stopped looking for Julia and the sudden halt of fervent searching, has given room for grief to well up in his chest. 

He curls up in himself as he cries, hiding himself from the world as well as he can. He should've ran faster, maybe then his older sister wouldn't have gone looking for him. A branch snaps nearby and Elmer looks up, staring right into the eyes of the boy from yesterday. "What's wrong?" the kid asks kindly and Elmer sniffles. "My sister went looking for me yesterday. She didn't get home before the sun was out and about." He shuts up after that and lets the implication sink in.

"I'm sorry", the other boy says and sits with Elmer. They don't exchange any words after that and Elmer passes through the gate before the sun has risen high enough to reach him. 

From that moment on, Elmer keeps returning to the gate very early in the morning. He doesn't know what draws him to the other boy, whose name is apparently Albert. As the years go on, they steal every little moment they can have together. Every time the day and the night touch and bleed into each other, Albert and Elmer will be sitting at the gate, discussing little things out of their day to day live. 

One day, when they both hit the age of fifteen, Albert stretches out his hand. It's late in the evening and the sun will soon go down. "Come with me", he says, as Elmer pointedly ignores the hand he can not touch. "Walk me to my gate. Night will be upon us soon and I want to spend a little more time with you." Deciding to trust Albert, Elmer walks with him until they reach a gate covered in flowers of all colours. The disappearing sun sets both the flowers and Albert's hair ablaze and once more Elmer gets reminded of how little they see each other, of just how much their worlds differ. He's fifteen when he waves Albert goodbye and notices that he's made the stupid mistake of falling in love with his best friend, who he can't talk with more than an hour a day. 

Slightly older now, but not very much wiser, they start challenging their time limits as they dart through the woods. Black hellebores and deep red amaranths bloom where their feet touch the ground and flowers that kill and heal prosper in the same areas. It's unnatural, it shouldn't be and yet Elmer can't help but meeting with Albert over and over. There's something addicting about the red haired young man, about his smile, about the stories he tells with a crooked grin plastered upon his face. 

Grandma Bronya has notices the increase of his happiness, as well as him staying out later and later and getting up earlier and earlier. "Your sister disappeared for love", she reminds him as his stomach twists. "You're heading down the same path, Elmer. I will not stop you, because I know I wouldn't succeed." 

The scary thing, Elmer thinks, is the fact that she's right. Right now, it's a little bit before sunrise again and he should be returning, yet he can't quite tear himself away from Albert just yet. The young man has lead him towards an open field, where they had watched the early morning stars together. Albert had brought along some fruits and sweets and as he presented them to Elmer, he had smiled. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were trying to seduce me", he joked and Albert had swallowed heavily. "What if I were?"

That oh so telling question leads them to their current predicament, where Elmer is staring at him, wide eyed and blushing furiously. Then reality sinks in again and he shakes his head. "Then I'd say you're a fool. Everything I touch dies, Albert."

"And things spring to life underneath my touch. We don't know what happens to creatures that stay beyond their limits, but I'd try it for you." As he looks at the brightening sky, Elmer pales. "It isn't you that's gonna stay beyond their limits", he whispers and as Albert looks at the morning sky, realisation dawns on his face. The open field they're staying in is too wide and Elmer would never reach his gate before the sun brightened the land. "Kiss me", he demands fiercely and silences the apologies on Albert's tongue. The other young man complies. Night and day, death and life and just two boys in love kiss each other in that one instance, in that open field of desperate hope.

**Author's Note:**

> This was a tumblr request. I’m rivertellsstories on tumblr if you’d like to request something or just hop by


End file.
